A Collection of Daily Wisdom by Dennis Sylvester Hurd since September 2003.

By a stroke of luck, I'm able to continue discussing yesterday's topic. I mentioned how hard it is to stay excited about where one lives after being there a long time. Then, out of the blue, a way to do so fell right into my lap.

Playing tour guide and giving advice is perhaps the best way to rekindle pride in one's home. Being able to suggest activities to out-of-towners can get one reacquainted with the joys of an area. Actually, Vancouver, BC is a beautiful place and merits a lot of bragging. It's blessed with geography, an environment, and a multicultural society, that really make it special.

I received an email from a retired teacher who taught me in Grade 5 in Sunapee, NH. He was a fairly new teacher in 1969/70! Ken Greenbaum and his wife will be coming out to catch one of the avalanche of Alaskan cruise ships that depart from here. Jay and I recall a stunning time aboard one. As the Greenbaums will be arriving two days early for their August departure, they asked for suggestions on what to do. There's a lot.

The picture to the right shows Jay before the quite formal, famous 'Captain's Party' on board an Alaskan Cruise in 2001.

Labels: Alaska, cruise, places, Vancouver

On Wednesday, my entry briefly mentioned the first summer in BC. After finding a place to rent, we had to find out about things around our new home in British Columbia. I love the feeling one has when exploring an unknown area, when every direction contains new experiences. It takes a great deal of work to keep up that inital love and awe for one's surroundings.


The last and only time we visited a private tourist attraction,
the Capilano Suspension Bridge, in North Vancouver was the summer of
our arrival.

I can't imagine living without personal transportation. Even though I frequently use public transit in order to get downtown, it'd not be convenient for learning the 'lay-of-the-land'. As soon as basic shelter was obtained, next, came a basic vehicle. Simply put, there are places we would never have seen were it not for truck ownership. My original plans were to make the brand-new, little Ranger last 12 years as that'd work out to $US 1000/year. Now that it's just a year shy of a decade, I think I can safely extend that original estimate.

Labels: opinions, places, Ranger, Vancouver

Last week, I had a message from Bret commenting on Star Wars Episode III. He recalled watching the original with a gang at the Claremont Drive-In Theater during the summer of 1977. We were newly minted high school graduates and were amazed by the authentic looking star ships. Additionally, I remember it as the first movie (and illegal copy) I ever saw on color, video tape back at Indian Cave Lodge in Sunapee, NH. --- Long live Betamax!

Jay and I must've been the only ones in the known universe who'd not been sucked into all the hype for the final installment. My advice, to those who camped out in order be among the first to get a ticket, would be they should've chilled out. It was a rainy Wednesday, and there were only nine other people in Cinema 13 of 16 in Coquitlam. Famous Players is not even breaking even for electricity in the state-of-the-art, stadium seating venue with such a meager crowd. Maybe if they reduced prices, more people would arrive and they'd actually make more money. Okay, that's fodder for another blog entry someday.

I was quite impressed with the movie. Critics had painted it as dark but I had no complaints. It was especially gratifying seeing it end with a scene nearly the same as one which had started it all back in 1977. The circle of six is complete and I thought things wrapped up well. Nothing in the movie prevented me from believing it couldn't have happened before the first, although movie technology has improved and 28 years have passed.

The only problem occurs when you jump back out to reality. The actress, Natalie Portman, who played Luke Skywalker's mother was born four years AFTER the first film was released. Time travel, a traditional theme of sci-fi, did not even feature in this series, did it?

Labels: Bret, movies, Sunapee

June has always been a time of change. We celebrate the anniversary of first arriving to live in Canada at the end of this month. This years makes the ninth. As a consequence, I've lived longer in Vancouver than any place since childhood.

Initially, I arrived as a visitor and needed an employment visa for my first job here.

In the fall of that first year, I began working for Pitman Business College, Vancouver. The post-secondary school was established in 1898. When I worked there, it was run by Mrs. Marie Tomko. As President and CEO, she was interested in tailoring a program for Vancouver's many visiting international students.

Labels: New Westminster

Thirty years ago, I was taking my Driver's Education classes, a needed prerequisite, to obtain an initial license. My 16th birthday occurred during the summer, so in order to take the course, I had to petition the Superintendent of Schools to enter the summer session in the neighbouring school district of Newport, NH. A whole group from Sunapee were in the same boat, so to speak, and decided to come along at the same time.



After three decades on the road I've only had one traffic violation. I was not even ticketed by an officer. In 2001, the picture above was sent to me by mail along with the bill for over $100. There wasn't much to do except pay it. Clearly, my Ranger pickup is entering the intersection after the light had already turned red. Damn you, Big Brother for being so observant!

Labels: cars, New Hampshire, Ranger

If yesterday's entry included the very first sample of my handwriting I could find, then this photo certainly pre-dates all personally-written records. If one picture is worth a thousand words though, what is being said here?


My mother was good about writing down the date on photos, but
unfortunately this one somehow escaped her attention.

Labels: New Hampshire

There's a whole project going on at BCIT that involves digital portfolios in learning. I have acquired an affinity for this phrase as I strongly support the idea of personal electronic storage. With costs on a downward spiral, there's no end to the personal minutiae we could keep. In fact, as an example, this whole blog is slowly developing into a storehouse of pictures and text of my life. It will take years to compile and as I'm at it, there'll be even more to include.

I'm not a verbose writer. In actuality, I am quite stingy with words. Some people go on and on and I'm sure what they say is carthatic but not very interesting to anyone except themselves. I'm sure all writers (and a majority of bloggers) are guilty of this to some degree. I wondered what I could put my hands on that would showcase my earliest writing and here's my result:



To see the whole document saved as PDF, click here. To see other 'life documents' that I'm starting to collect, visit my PDF Storage Room. As you can clearly see, I wholeheartedly believe there's no such thing as a waste of hard disk space.